Bad News, Another MRI and my First CT Scan with Contrast Agent

We finished our particularly busy period at work at the end of July and then thankfully went straight onto Summer Leave, boy I needed it! Out of the blue in my second week around mid August the telephone rang. I was amazed and not a little worried to hear my consultant speak, ‘well Mr Parke the results of the Multi Disciplinary Team meeting were not as positive as we had hoped, the members all agree that you have at least one lesion in your brain and possibly two others rapidly developing. It is imperative that we now conduct more scans, can you come back next week? My first thought was ‘how the hell did YOU miss this?!’

Clearly this was serious and I was floored by the news, however Kady and I were busy planning our wedding for the following year and had booked a trip abroad to the Greek Island of Kefalonia in order to tie up the details. I explained the situation and could it wait a week – bearing in mind this had already been dragging on for months now(!!!) – yes it could.

The Spire Hospital Southampton

So less than 48 hours after getting back from Kefalonia Kady and I found ourselves at this charming establishment waiting to see the ‘Top Man’ brain surgeon in the South of England. We had to be there a few hours early for the MRI and CT scans and I had to drink some concoction that was like some crazy protein drink, to fill me with tumour reflecting magic juice. I then went in for a CT scan of my chest,abdomen and pelvis http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/X-ray_computed_tomography followed by yet another MRI of my brain http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magnetic_resonance_imaging both with further contrast agent injections.

Although it didn’t occur to me at the time, they clearly already had a good idea in their minds of what was going on and were giving me the full suite of tests to confirm it. As always the medical staff were exceptionally friendly and helpful. The worst part was in the middle of the CT Scan when they injected me with the contrast agent and it felt like there was a volcanic eruption in my chest and I had an urge to wet myself at the same time – apparently they normally warn you about this. They must have been having a bad day.

CT Scanner

Both scans were done and I may have been being paranoid but I thought I could detect a change in the attitude of the Radiologists who could see the results. Kady and I went straight from the Radiology Dept to see the Neurosurgeon…